If I were running a large company I'd start moving now. If that's what you get for 8 unlicensed copies I'd hate to see what would happen with 500. Jan On Sun, 2003-03-02 at 05:38, Darren Landrum wrote: > I remember reading about this some time ago. > > The BSA is running into a very interesting problem: Their heavy-handed > tactics are driving customers away. Basically, they got their $90K out of > Ernie Ball, and went away short-term happy, so Sterling decided to make > their long term numbers suffer. > Anyone want to start a betting pool on the next company to switch to > Free/Open Software due to the BSA? > The thing is, though, is that Ernie Ball is a relatviely small company, > and making a complete switch (almost literally overnight) was not that > difficult for them. Now what would happen if, say, HP got hit by millions > in fines from the BSA (other than more layoffs...)? They wouldn't have the > ready option of switching because they are too big of a company. > Since most music companies are smaller (Yamaha being a notable exception), > I wonder if any others have plans to follow suit just to avoid an audit... > Anyone know? > > -- Darren > > > >Jan \Evil Twin\ Depner > > I know that there are quite a few musicians on this list so I thought > > they might be interested in this (if they didn't already know about > > it). > > > > I was reading an article yesterday (I don't remember where) that was > > talking about the BSA fining businesses for unlicensed software. Lo > > and behold, the first business cited (for 8 unlicensed copies of M$) > > was Ernie Ball/Music Man. Apparently they got stung for $90,000.00 US. > > The article stated that Ernie Ball immediately switched to "open > > source" and never looked back. Being a curious person, I sent an email > > to Ernie Ball to find out what "open source" meant. The answer is Red > > Hat > > Linux. It's nice to see a fairly large music business getting the > > message. > > > > It appears that the BSA may be one of open source's biggest allies. > > > > > > Jan > > > > Regards, > Darren Landrum > >
